Microwaves injected into the interior of a microwave oven rebound about the walls and door of the interior. As a result, the microwaves will sometimes interfere with one another to produce cold spots or will strengthen one another to produce hot spots. These cold spots and hot spots will vary depending upon the cookware inserted into the microwave oven.
Over a period of years advances have been made in eliminating this nonuniformity of microwave energy distribution. However, some nonuniformity still exists and, as a result, many microwave cook booklets suggest the desirability of stopping the oven periodically and physically rotating the food.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,036,151 to Shin and 4,591,682 to Takeuji disclose microwave ovens having a built-in turntable to effect uniform heating. Many conventional microwave ovens, however, do not include turntables. Therefore, to eliminate the inconvenience of manually rotating food, a need exists for a portable turntable that may be purchased as an accessory for a conventional microwave oven.
Portable turntables are known. Typically, the prior art portable turntable is a unitary apparatus that does not permit easy cleaning of internal workings. Yet these internal workings are sometimes invaded by food particles and make the turntable susceptible to breakdowns. Also, since the weight of a serving dish and the food within the serving dish may separate the table top from the point of drive, it is important to be able to easily inspect the turntable interior.
An object of the present invention is to provide a microwave oven turntable having an easy inspection and cleaning feature.